Sutton Virtual School is committed to ensuring Designated Teachers can receive access to high quality training to support them in their role. Please review the training options below to ensure that you have a strong understanding of your role as Designated Teacher and are actively engaging in training that will support Children Looked After in your school.
Sutton Virtual School Summer Term CPD programme DTDSL 2024-25
Sutton Designated Teacher network meetings
Designated Teacher Network Meeting – Monday 17th March 2025, 3:30-5pm
Designated Teacher Network Meeting – Thursday 12th June 2025, 3:30-5pm
Sutton Virtual School – Trauma surgery (for Designated Teachers and Trauma Champions)
Dates to follow.
New to Role Designated Teacher training:
New to Role Designated Teacher training session – Monday 11th November 2024, 3:30-4:30pm
New to Role Designated Teacher training session – Thursday 16th January 2025, 3:30-4:30pm
New to Role Designated Teacher training session – Tuesday 24th June 2025, 3:30-4:30pm
We will run further sets of new to role training as required for any DTs who will be moving into a new role and will let you know once these dates are released.
We would appreciate any feedback in relation to the training on offer at present as we are continually seeking to improve our offer.
Executive Functioning Training
Designated Teachers would benefit from watching the series of 6 videos related to supporting young people with executive functioning difficulties as this is often a need of Children Looked After and Previously Looked After.
Trauma & Executive Function Series
Mental Health training: Place2be
Place2be is a children’s mental health charity that provides counselling and mental health support and training in UK schools.
Designated Teachers can access direct online training for their school, which is led by a qualified practitioner to help process classroom experiences and wellbeing support. It is important that all Designated Teachers have a strong understanding of mental health and wellbeing to ensure effective support for Children Looked After in school.
Financial Education training
As we know, care leavers move into independence and become responsible for their own finances at a much younger age than their peers in the general population, and in most cases do not have family support networks to rely on. As a consequence, they are at higher risk of financial vulnerability and many experience problems with debt and arrears. This is often due to a lack of understanding of how to maintain a tenancy, pay bills and budget effectively. Research indicates that around one third of care leavers become homeless within the first two years of leaving care, impacting on their ability to secure or remain in education or employment and experience good mental health and wellbeing. The report ‘Care to talk about money? The importance of financial education for children in care’ has demonstrated the impact that financial education can have for young people in care. Designated Teachers can access these resources to ensure that key staff in the school are able to educate children looked after around finance. To support staff to have the confidence in delivering financial education we encourage Designated Teachers to arrange for staff to access Young Money online training.
There is also the ability for schools to gain additional free mentoring and support with staff training through MoneyHeroes.